This Tercel has been in the neighborhood for all of its long life. I noticed it not long after we moved here—very close to 30 years ago. It used to be owned by a woman down the block, and then she sold it to a guy around the corner, and now it lives about five blocks away. The current owner tells me it was originally bought new by a UO professor who used to live nearby.
It just won’t quit…until the morning a few days ago when I drove by and saw it being ministrated to by its owner and a mechanically-minded friend.
I pulled over in my 19 year old “Toyota”, a mere babe compared to this one, which is about twice that age. The two were trying to figure out whether it was missing spark or gas. My guess was the latter, as it had coughed and run roughly before it quite the day before.
These Tercels have a rep for being very durable, but like all cars from the ’80s, they do have a spaghetti of vacuum hoses and such, on the intake side. Nevertheless, they soldier on, at least a few of them still do her in Eugene.
I left them to determine which critical element was missing. When I drove by later, the Tercel was back in the driveway. It’s good to go again. Maybe it will eventually get passed on to another neighbor?
…..unless it was pushed into the driveway.
I’ve seen the driveway empty since then too.
Vacuum hoses on pre-EFI cars are an issue, especially on a car like this where the only thing that killed them off in the rest of the country is road salt.
One of my college roommates had one of these Tercels and it stood out to me the one time I borrowed it how solid the secondary controls like the turn signal switch felt compared to my (Mitsubishi) Dodge Colt and my mom’s (genuine Mopar) Plymouth Horizon. All from the mid 80s, all going on 10 years old at the time.
Agreed. In the early 80’s I borrowed a friend’s late 70’s Honda Civic while my ’79 Corvette was in the body shop. I though it would be a huge step down; in reality, I hated to give it back. The ‘Vette seemed like an underpowered sled in comparison. To be fair, 1979 was about as low as the Corvette got, but still. . .
So long as (1) you don’t live in a rust zone; and (2) your daily commute doesn’t involve highway travel with a lot of much bigger vehicles; you can’t do much better than an older Toyota subcompact hatchback for cheap reliable and practical transportation. Other than the Echo – that one was a rare Toyota misfire.
The Echo looked dorky, but was every bit as reliable as other Toyotas. It was just a Yaris with a trunk grafted on. There’s still a number of Echos here.
Thanks; I should have been more precise. I wasn’t commenting on the Echo’s reliability; only on its road manners, which I got from a couple of car magazine articles when it first came out.
Echo’s looked “ungainly”. They’re actually as durable as the Tercel they replaced.
I have a real fondness for all Toyotas of that era. I had an ‘81 Corolla hardtop that was my first new car, and it seemed throughout the ‘80s and into the’90s Toyota released hit after competent hit. A good friend drove his base ‘91 Tercel to 300k miles before he “upgraded” to a 2014 Civic.
I have a real soft spot for Toyotas of that vintage. While it is true from the late 70’s to the mid-80’s Toyota’s carburetors and emission controls became more and more complex and potentially trouble-prone, they rarely caused more than driveablilty issues and failed smog tests. If a Toyota of this era konked out, it was usually the ignition igniter or fuel pump.
I had an ’83 or ’84 four door, white, 5 speed for a couple of years in the early-90s. Outstanding car. Everything worked, the AC was cold, the heater hot; I don’t remember anything at all needing repair. An outstanding commuter, it regularly returned 35mpg, scaled mountain highways with ease, and was excellent in deep snow. Replaced it with a 2nd gen Camry wagon ’cause I needed more room.
I drove a early 90s ex JDM Tercel loaner a little while ago, turn the key noise emittred from the front put it in R for racing, it went backwards, D for deliver me, it got me home, approach a sharp turn in normal Citroen driver mode it didnt like that at all but the brakes worked once Id realised my mistake. An economical reliable little car I reckon, still doing its thing years after the scrap by date expired just like its featured cousin.
I had a rwd 73 Corolla Levin coupe with a 4 speed manual and a pair of twin barrel carbs, seeing that Tercels engine reminded me of it, might be the same engine family. It was an import, I dont think we got anything other than regular slower Corolla sedans. I bought it from a guy who almost shipped it out, it was already at the docks!
It was the first generation of the well known line of the sporty Corolla based Levin / Trueno coupes, if later AE86 parts fit I would have probably kept it because finding any parts for it that didn’t have to come from Japan were limited to oil filters and spark plugs and that was too much of a headache for me.
Weird, I’d have thought even one of this generation would be FWD…guess it could still be, but the north-south engine throws me, I’m so used to transverse engines with FWD I expect all of them to be that way (never had an Audi, Tornado, or other FWD car with north-south engine)
The only Toyota in my family was my sister’s ’90 coupe, it was OK, but someone left off a heat shield and the carpeting melted under the catalytic converter. For some reason we’ve gravitated more to Nissan, that same sister owns a ’97 240SX, her 2nd (and my dear departed youngest sister owned a 200SX and yet another 240SX, while I owned a ’74 Datsun 710). Youngest sister’s 200SX had lots of vaccum lines and she left it with me to try to fix…found a crack in the rubber after the air filter once patched it ran much better.
I think these started being sold in ’82 or ’83 in the US, I think they were an early FWD model for Toyota. Instead of a Tercel, somehow my Mother arranged for me to rent a Starlet which was my only US rental experience with a manual transmission. I was interviewing for a job in a nearby town after they’d moved to Texas (yes, I followed them there…). The Starlet was RWD, a good basic car, like they no longer offer anywhere.
These, along with its predecessor, are indeed FWD. There is some debate as to the true logic behind the north-south engine layout, but Toyota upon the first generation car’s debut claimed it could facilitate a possible four wheel drive variant relatively easily in the future. That materialized with this generation not just as the wagon we knew here, but also as four door sedans back in Japan; prior to four wheel drive Tercels, the only four wheel drive passenger car available from Japan was Subaru’s Leone series, so Toyota no doubt wanted a share of that steadily growing market segment for themself and possibly held off until the second generation car in order to gauge how successful their first front wheel drive product faired in general before committing to do so. While the first Tercel was often sold on the cheap here, back in Japan it was typically positioned more as a premium product relative to its size with pricing not dissimilar to an equivalently equipped and larger Corolla.
Thanks, Cjiguy, for the details I didn’t suspect. There are other cars with north-south engines that never offered four wheel drive, like my Uncle’s ’99 Passat and the original Dasher, and of course the Tornado (not to mention most RWD vehicles). Nowdays it seems that even having a transverse engine doesn’t preclude AWD and I guess transverse is a bit easier to package at least for FWD, don’t know how AWD complicates that as I’ve never had a vehicle with AWD. Yes, and my sister’s Tercel hardly seemed like a luxury model, but on my few trips to Japan I’ve been amazed by the variety of vehicles I’ve never seen in the US, so I can appreciate we only get to see the tip of the ice burg in terms of what’s available elsewhere. Back in ’89 one of my co-workers from the US saw a Japanese (not sure which make) crew cab pickup while we were in Japan, years before they became commonplace here, said something like “wow, if they’d bring that to the US I’d buy it”…and by now he probably does.
Yes, my Dad actually bought a new ’76 Subaru DL, which at the time was only available in FWD like most Subarus back then, think they only had a wagon with AWD that year. Subaru really committed to AWD and made a name for themselves for that. After a few years my Dad gave up the DL to my sister, her husband didn’t think much of it until he found out some places would allow Subarus to park for free near the ski area (guess they didn’t discriminate between FWD and AWD models) after which his opinion of the car went up, back in the day he was into skiing. My Dad just bought it as a commuter, he just wanted something with good traction (we were living in Vermont then; 10 years prior he had VW Beetle then Renault R10 as rear engine RWD, but FWD cars initially were selling for a pretty good premium until they became more commonplace).
First & second gen Tercel fwd had the longitudinal engine.
My parents had a blue 1984 4 door Tercel. Slow and boring to drive. Didn’t have the nimble feel that many small cars have. Not nearly the fun that my 1979 Rabbit provided. But it was very reliable and driveable. Basically just routine maintenance for 20 years and 150k miles. Still going strong when they passed it along.
Have an “81 Celica ST” here in my neighborhood. Been here since I moved in (spring 1994).
I think it got some “work done” about “2019”.
I recall it being absent for a spell.
It’s a “survivor” for sure, not “restored”.
IIRC the first gen Tercels were really ugly, and that one’s just kind of bland.
Obviously dunno from here, but I wonder if it might be… A cousin of mine, car guy even, had an early Tercel. He did restoration work on automotive wood interiors and was delivering a job 500 miles from home when his Tercel just died on the freeway in LA. Coasted off into a gas station, when they still worked on stuff, they diagnosed and changed his broken timing belt in a few hours and he was on his way. He knew better than to ignore it, but he did anyway, but still lucked out.
So…could it be a timing belt?
My first car was a used ‘86 2-door Tercel—in the lowest possible trim—that looked like this one, but with tan exterior and tan vinyl interior (seating AND floor surfaces—carpets and cloth seats are for the RICH people) that was cold in winter and sweaty in summer. It had a 4-speed manual, no AC, crank windows, rear view mirror only on the driver side, totally gutless to drive, but was cheap to operate for a college kid.
It only came with two speakers in the lower dash (absolutely no wiring needed for the doors!), so my second-ever mod was installing two speakers I pulled out of a junk yard on the rear strut towers in cardboard enclosures (I was FRUGAL). I did splurge on my first-ever mod: a leather TRD shift knob proudly displaying the 4MT shift pattern.
I was so clueless about cars I thought it was RWD because of the longitudinal engine and transmission, until one day I FINALLY chirped the front tires in 1st gear in the rain—because there’s no way it had enough grunt to do so on dry pavement.
I do feel nostalgic about it. I lived in Berkeley and one night after a late night in the lab, the starter had quit but luckily the car was parked facing DOWN HILL so I could roll down and jump start it to get home—it would’ve been impossible to do had I parked facing UP. But if I still had the car today, there’s no way I’d drive it because there’s no joy in the driving experience, and it offers all the crash protection of a tin can.
But, I guess one never forgets the first…
I remember you could get a Weber progressive carb to replace the original and then plug up all the vacuum lines. Probably no longer available. I had an Echo that went 300,000 miles before I sold it. I recently bought an old ’07 Yaris because I needed a car after my ’17 Subaru crapped out.
Vacuum lines. They do start to get hard as a rock after years and years in an engine compartment baking away. I just spent last weekend changing out vacuum lines in the 91 626 for nice, new, supple rubber hose. Once did the same thing on the 67 Park Lane which has a ton of them and can sprout hard to diagnose vacuum leaks because they are so subtle.